Venus - Peter O'Toole interview

PETER O’Toole talks about playing a veteran actor in Venus, his young co-star [Jodie Whittaker] and breaking his hip during filming. He was speaking at a UK press conference...

Q. Given the themes of age and mortality in Venus, it’s a very poignant film but would you also describe it as celebratory?
Peter O’Toole: There’s astonishing poignancy from my point of view. It’s not the easiest thing in the world to be objective about a film in which one is in every scene. So subjectively, in my view, Maurice is celebratory. It’s die at the right time and don’t hang up with a dream for too long – and have a goal. His goal is to do a decent job at work, get a few bob and take a very pretty girl to the seaside and have some champagne and oysters – and maybe a stroll along the beach!

Q. How did you find working with newcomer Jodie Whittaker? And what do you think of the general standard of young actors in cinema today?
Peter O’Toole: My great blessing is being able to work with young people. One of the great things in the world is the number of able young men and women who are in the business. When I work with them, I can assure you I just grab hold of energy by the handful from people like Jodie. She’s not only an accomplished young woman, but she’s a very, very special person. She’s got lots and lots of qualities that I’m extremely fond of.

Q. Can you tell us about breaking your hip during filming?
Peter O’Toole: It’s a very sorry lesson. Once upon a time I used to say – and I said it with conviction – that the only exercise I’d take was following the coffins of friends who took exercise. That was the case until last year when a doctor waved a finger at me and I finished up at the MCC’s Indoor Cricket School at Lord’s where I spent six weeks with international cricketers. I tried to keep up and did the best I could but I came out the other end astoundingly fit and bore everyone stupid, climbing stairs and hills.

It came to Christmas and we’d been filming Venus for several weeks. It had been hard work and I woke up on Boxing Day morning and realised that I wasn’t working. It was 7am and I hopped out of bed, tripped over a pair of shoes and thumped my hip. So all that good exercise went to waste. I had to pop into hospital, they stuck a new one in and here we are. But it happens to billions of people.

Q. I read a quote from Jodie where she revealed that her mum and dad knew of you from Lawrence of Arabia and she’d seen you in King Ralph! Having done almost everything, how do you decide what to do next? What takes your interest?
Peter O’Toole: The same as it always has, a good part and a good script. Good parts make good actors and if that good part happens to be surrounded also by a good script then you’ve got chances…

But King Ralph is an example of true, true bottomless stupidity. This was a script that was on very, very thin ice indeed. Nevertheless, the skaters were there to do it! Leslie [Phillips] is as experienced a comedian as anyone in this country. I’m not bad. John Goodman is an expert. The late James Villiers was a brilliant comedian. John Hurt and Richard Griffiths know a little bit about comedy.

This was a team of first-class comedians and we could have skated very sweetly across it. But he [the director] thought he was dealing with The Madness of King George III! He wasn’t, it was a bit of froth. My favourite moment was when Jimmy Villiers did a scene where he bowed to the king and the director said: “You’re looking at your mark!” He thought he’d caught him out. But Jimmy turned round and said: “I’m bowing to my monarch, you pillock!”

Q. You’ve worked with a who’s who of actors both in film and on stage. If you could go back and revisit a performance that really took your breath away and you could play it, who would it be?
Peter O’Toole: May I answer in two parts? Performer and someone I was performing with. The one that knocked me sideways and still does is Laurence Olivier in Titus Andronicus. I was playing at the Garrick. They were at the Stole, a big theatre. I saw it six times from A6 in the front row. Each time it increased my own concerns about my own ability. It was a superb performance.

And to work with, I would love to work again and again and again with Jack Hawkins, perhaps the funniest man who ever lived. By that I mean his stories and his sense of humour.